Bitten Panel with Greyston Holt at MCM Birmingham Comic Con

“It has everything you could want from a werewolf show,” said Greyston Holt, who stars as Clayton Danvers on the drama series Bitten. “It’s sexy, it’s action-packed, it’s violent, it’s gory, it’s intense.” Greyston was at MCM Birmingham Comic Con to talk about the show, though while it is has been airing in the US and Canada, he did acknowledge that he wasn’t sure when it would be broadcast in the UK. “I wish I had an answer,” he said. “I don’t know if it’s certain that it will. If it does I’m assuming it will be on Syfy.”

Based on the novel by Kelley Armstrong (which is part of the Women of the Otherworld series), the show centres on Elena Michaels (played by Laura Vandervoort), a lone female werewolf who has been trying to lead a normal life in Toronto. However, she suddenly receives a call from Jeremy Danvers (played by Greg Bryk) – the leader of a pack of werewolves at Stonehaven who asks Elena for her help in tracking down a killer. She returns to confront her past, which includes her ex-boyfriend Clayton Danvers (played by Greyston Holt), who also happens to be the one that bit Elena.

Greyston revealed how Bitten is a little different from the traditional werewolf stories that we know of, for a werewolf transformation does not necessarily occur during a full moon, but through certain urges or instincts. “Sexual urges, hunger, fear, anger – it can bring it all out,” said Greyston. “A well trained werewolf can learn how to control these urges. It makes for an interesting show too, because you never know what’s going to happen. It could happen in situations where you really don’t want it to – you’re having sex with your human boyfriend and all of a sudden he turns into a werewolf… it doesn’t go over too well.”

A member of the audience asked Greyston about the shows he has starred in, asking him if he had a favourite. “Other than Bitten, which has been my favourite by far, I just did a guest star on Supernatural, which was a ton of fun. They film that show in Vancouver, where I live, and it’s in its ninth season now. I’ve been dying to get in on that show.”

The next question from the audience was more of a request, asking Greyston to say, ‘Darling’. He laughed and then fulfilled the request, saying (in a very deep voice) “Darling.” He also explained the significance of this. “For those that haven’t read the books, it’s a big thing that Clay Danvers calls Elena darling. It’s a thing.”

Greyston was then asked about the most fun he’s had on set. “Other than walking around naked a lot?” he said, a response that was greeted with a few whoops from some members of the audience. He then revealed that while he was “very comfortable” with being naked on the set of Bitten, this comfort did not extend to the rest of the crew. “The first scene I shot of the show, my very first scene, [I was told] ‘We need you to be naked.’ I was like, ‘Alright, cool, I’ll just go totally naked.’ And they’re like, ‘Well no, for the comfort of the crew we’d like you to put this sock on.’”

Greyston also highlighted the fight scenes as another fun part. While not a violent person (“The violent side was a challenge for me. I’ve never been in a fight in my life”) he did reveal that he really enjoys doing the fight choreography. So a question from Twitter had him being asked what his favourite fight scene was to film. “Actually, the episode that just aired in Canada, Episode 11 (‘Settling’), I’m at Philip’s apartment, who is Elena’s boyfriend, and I’m basically protecting him from… two Mutts, I’m fighting off these two guys at the same time. It was very hard; it took nine hours to film. It looks incredible!”

He described his co-star Laura Vandervoort as “great” and “hilarious”, and said that during the audition process the two of them quickly developed the chemistry that was needed. “It was super comfortable from the get-go,” said Greyston. “It needs to be because that relationship is so complicated. It’s nice to have a fellow actor that’s on the same page as you, that trusts you and you trust them.”

Having read the book on which the show is based, Greyston was asked if he had ever met the author Kelley Armstrong, and revealed that he did meet her during a press tour a week before the show was aired . “It was interesting to pick her brain,” he said. “I don’t know if I would have wanted to prior to filming, just because she has strong feelings about her book, her characters. But we had a great chat and she’s definitely happy with it.”

Having been involved in numerous shows Greyston was then asked about the biggest thing he’s learnt from his experiences of being an actor. He thought about this for a moment. “Persistence pays off, I guess? I mean, you kinda have to stick with it and have thick skin, because there’s a lot of rejection and it’s for many reasons that are out of your control. You can’t take it personally.” He then recalled how in the past he had failed to get a part simply because his eyes were green. “When I was younger, it was really hard to picture where I wanted to be, especially if you’re an actor because everything is out of your control. There are a lot of amazing actors in the world currently working that never get there and want to get there. I’m just happy I got to where I’m at.”

“I read a lot about wolves and the behaviour of wolves themselves,” said Greyston, when asked if he did any research on werewolves. “One thing I did in particular, when I was going to try out for the screen test, when I was close to booking the role… in Vancouver there’s mountains surrounding most of the city… there’s all these hiking trails. I went up there when it was dark, took all my clothes off, left them in my backpack, left the trail and just ran around naked and just howled… in the forest… for a couple of hours. It was kind of fun just getting it out of your system. I guess it helped because I got the role!”

He also revealed how wolf-like qualities come into play even when he and other werewolf characters are in their human form. “There’s a scene in the second episode where we all sit down to have dinner. There’s a hierarchy in a pack of wolves and so we all sit down and nobody can eat until Jeremy eats. That’s one of my favourite scenes.”

Greyston was finally asked if any more characters from the books would make it into the series. After a bit of thought he said, “I’m gonna say no,” but he did leave off saying that there are some surprises. “Some characters will be killed that aren’t killed in the books,” and “somebody who’s bad might not be bad…”